Gray Like Ivy
by greysky3
Summary: The flock meets a surprising little girl called Ivy. Will it bring them all closer together or tear them apart? Rated T for language. I do not own Maximum Ride.
1. Chapter 1

Early mornings with three hyperactive kids, and two grumpy ones: not my idea of a perfect vacation. Why, may you ask, were we going on vacation? Well, the "vacation" part was just a cover for another mission. Fang had found there was a huge lab where they were experimenting on avian DNA-hybrids. Probably another building full of bird kids—like us. Even though I'm the leader-all-powerful, when the younger kids get stubborn, there's going to be trouble.

Angel, Gazzy and Nudge suddenly went into full-on boycott mode when I told them we were going to go destroy _another_ lab. Kids these days! Destroying evil scientists' labs isn't _fun_ enough anymore. Luckily, Fang suggested it would be a vacation trip to Baltimore—then everything changed. With the help of his laptop and a few images of the harbor that I was sure were photoshopped, everyone agreed to come.

Then the coffee comes in—just wait for it. I suggested we take a break from flying. We touched down in Kansas, in this place called Junction City. Did you know there is a huge Starbucks in Junction City? I sure didn't. Until Nudge came out with a XXL Vanilla Spice Frappuccino, followed by Gazzy holding a Caramel Macchiato that was at least half as big as his head.

So now we were flying over the Kansas-Missouri border. Nudge lifted her wing a little to swerve closer to me. "Coffee is so good. Did you know that New Yorkers drink almost seven times as much coffee than other cities in the U.S.? How do they measure that? Do they ask people how much coffee they drink a day? Maybe that could be a question on the Census. 'How much coffee do you drink every day?' What if people lied? Then the whole thing would be wrong. How do the Census people know that we're not lying?" Nudge looked at me, genuinely concerned for the Census people.

"Don't know, don't care," I replied. Nudge frowned at me and went to talk to Gazzy, who was screaming his head off while making loops and figure eights in the air. Ah, the wonders of caffeine.

Fang was flying silently below me, carrying a canvas bag. By its size, I could tell it contained his precious laptop. He spent so much time on it that it was practically glued to his face. I almost laughed at the thought. "What?" he said defensively, calling from down below me. "Nothing," I said.

Iggy was flying silently to my right, with no possessions whatsoever. He looked—free. Happy. Angel was flying down below, holding Celeste dangerously by the halo. I was _not_ going to get that back if it fell down into Missouri. Note to self: buy Celeste a leash.

Overall, the trip was going terribly. But at least the kids weren't saying—"I'm hungry!" Gazzy wailed. I groaned. "Fine, we'll stop at McDonald's." Everyone cheered—wait, no, not Fang. I folded in my wings a little. The Baltimore Avian DNA facility was going to have to wait.


	2. Chapter 2

An hour later, and six or seven Big Macs later, we were back flying. I looked over the flat land. We'd been flying for a good while now, and it was almost night. Maybe we could land—where were we already? It just seemed like more nothing. We passed state after state without really seeing much, except once in a while a cluster of bright lights that I took to be cities. Now would be a good time for existentialist questions like "look how small I am compared to this big world," or "the world is full of mysteries," but mostly I was thinking about whether we could stay at an _actual hotel_ in Baltimore.

The sun was starting to set. "Okay everyone, we're going down," a grateful murmur answered me. I folded my wings in and shot down, opening my wings to catch the wind at the last moment, like a parachute. I could never get tired of doing that. I landed softly on dirt, near a road. A sign showed "Kettering, Ohio- Ten miles." We were close. I smiled and gathered some branches to light a fire.

Ten minutes later, everyone was asleep. I quit poking at the fire and decided to finally curl up and sleep. Yawning, I make my way over to a place further away from the fire where I can doze off comfortably.

"Look, Baltimore!" Gazzy yelled, swooping down to get a better look. Salty air spraying from below, I was really enjoying myself. "The boats look so tiny. We must look like little birds to the people below," Nudge commented.

Angel was narrating everything for Celeste. "See, this is Baltimore. Max says we have to go bust up this other lab. Because there are more bird kids. I think it's boring, but Fang says we can have a real vacation."

At least she wasn't being _too_ negative. And she didn't see this trip as another opportunity to take over the world. "What does it look like?" Iggy asked.

"Um," I said, looking over the harbor. "Well, there's water. And boats. And, you know, buildings."

"Wow, what a poet. I really have a clear image in my head," he said. "I'll just ask someone else."

I turned my attention back to where we were. We were just above the park. I tucked in my wings and landed right inside of the gate. Five small sounds told me the flock was right behind me.

We were in Patterson Park, and apparently, in this place called the Pagoda, there was an entrance to an underground lab. Some kid actually commented this onto Fang's blog, with pictures on a map. I had thought it was just a prank when I noticed the Itex logo in the corner of a picture. The kid wouldn't have known about that.

Anyway, we were already there, and after this we had to have fun on our vacation. I walked up to an overly smiling tour guide in a fuzzy hat that probably made her feel better about the environment. She handed me a brochure that had a map. Followed by the rest of the flock, I walked away quickly. The whole setup was…too easy. There was really no kind of security whatsoever.

I opened the map she had given me. It had the Pagoda clearly marked. On the back, there was this whole section on "the birds of Patterson Park." It said there were over 170 bird species identified in the park. This was probably a great place for the lab. The scientists could have all the birds they wanted to use their DNA.

I hurried over to the Pagoda. The whole park was silent, other than the noise of the birds. There was just one security guard at the Pagoda. _Everything here feels like a trap, _I thought. He nodded to us and we just…went in. A woman at a desk was typing away at her computer. I looked around. There were winding stairs going all the way up into the charming building to see the view above. There was also a door that said "No Access," with a slot for a key card. Bingo.

I motioned over to Angel, and she nodded. She looked straight into the secretary's eyes. Slowly, her face relaxed. Angel kept staring intently. "We need to get into that door," she said slowly.

"Get into…the door," the woman repeated dreamily. "You're going to let us in, then forget about it," Angel told her firmly.

"Let…you in. Then, forget," she murmured. Dazed, she got up from behind her tiny desk and pulled a key card out of her pocket. She swiped it in and a light flashed green. She opened the door for us, and we all filed in. She then went back to her desk. The door swung shut behind us.


	3. Chapter 3

I slowly walked down the steps. They were lit with bright white fluorescent lights. Those lights lit up so many bad memories. A small plaque on the wall says the building was closed in 1951 and renovated. _Probably when they added the underground secret facility. _It said the Pagoda's "new facilities" were a generous gift from the Institute for Higher Aeronautics. That was another branch of the Institute, also where the Erasers got their wings. Yeah, we were in the right place.

The stairs stopped and there was a clean white door. I pushed it and entered a room full of cages. There were mutants, hybrids, cowering in little dog crates. No whitecoats were in sight. "Okay," I said, "let's open these cages."

I started unlocking the simple latches on the dog crates, letting out kids with scales, extra limbs, and quite a few with wings. There was a heavy curtain at the end of the room. I strode over to it and opened the curtains. There was a single dog crate with a little girl in it. She had little striped wings, like a hawk's. A tangle of light brown curls hid her face.

A tag on the crate showed she was "Subject AKW-3." A stack of papers with numbers and names was clipped to the side of the cage. I took the papers and yanked the cage door open. An alarm started to wail. Turning around, I saw the other cages were opened, and Iggy and Fang were herding the mutants upstairs. "Come on!" I said urgently to the little winged girl, extending my hand.

Apparently she could understand speech, because she decided to trust me and scrambled out of the cage. She was wearing a pale green hospital gown. Doors started to open and bewildered whitecoats were starting to come in. I took the girl's hand and ran into the door that was being held open. "We're getting out of here!" I said for the benefit of the flock. They al scrambled after us and ran upstairs.

All six of us and the little mutant burst out of the Pagoda. Mutants were invading Patterson Park. The ones with wings were already flying away, and the ones that didn't have any were escaping into the city. There was nothing I could really do for them. Maybe they would start their own flocks.

The little winged girl extended her small wings. She tried flapping and actually got some lift. Pumping harder, she finally got to stay in the air for a few seconds. Immediately after, she fell back to the ground. There was no way she could fly anywhere until she learned to take control of her wings. And there was no way I was going to abandon her.

"We need to find a hotel," I said, defeated. Everyone cheered. We all walked through Baltimore's deserted afternoon streets. We finally walked up to a Best Western. The clerk didn't even seem surprised that seven unaccompanied minors were asking for a hotel room. I liked this place.

I gave him my old credit card and he swiped it. His smile got a lot bigger when he saw what was loaded onto it. He gave us the key card to our room. We walked cautiously up the stairs and to our floor. I swiped the key card, and the door opened to a huge three-room, seven-bed suite. There was a general squeal of delight as everyone raced to claim a bed. Only the winged girl stayed behind me.

I had to start calling her something. She needed a name. I closed the door behind me. "What's your name, sweetie?" She looked at me with wide eyes.

"I don't have one," she said in a tiny voice. That made sense. The whitecoats never even bothered to give us names either. I looked her over. Her tangled hair somewhat out of her face, I saw she had wide gray eyes. She was small, with short legs and arms, and her face still had some baby roundness. I'd say she was about four.

"Okay, well, for starters, you're four." She nodded, happy to know something about herself. I walked over to the nearest bed and sat on it. The bed was too high for her, but she extended her small wings and fluttered up. I took out the stack of papers to see if I could pick out a name or something.

The first paper had all the medicine and chemicals they had given "Subject AKW-3." The second and third pages had the tests they had run her through. Then, the fourth page had on it "origins of experiment." Perfect. It was all encrypted, but I saw the name of a hospital, John Hopkins Hospital. A basic map accompanied it. The hospital must have been where she was born. It wasn't too far from Patterson Park. "You were born here," I said to her, showing her the paper.

She took it in her tiny fists and looked at it hungrily. The next page was even more interesting. "Donors of experiment," the page announced. Quickly scanning the page, I found that her parents were listed as "Male and Female, Caucasian. Anonymous."

Then, there was an address. 2033 Ivy Ave, Baltimore, MD. It was her parents' address. On it was stamped "Former residence." They had moved. There really was no trace of the girl's parents. "Your parents lived in Ivy Avenue, in Baltimore. I don't have their names, or yours," I told her.

I hated to see the disappointed look she had. "But," I added quickly, "you can pick your _own_ name." She thought about it. Her small brows furrowed in concentration, and it was so adorable I almost laughed.

"Ivy Avenue." _Ivy Avenue?_ _That_ was the name she was picking? On second thought, it wasn't that bad. Tell your average four-year-old girl to name herself; she'll pick something like Sparkly Unicorn Fairy Princess. Ivy Avenue I could work with.

"Well, Ivy, what's your birthday going to be?" I asked her. She didn't think about this question as much. "January," she said quietly. "That's when the whitecoats had break. They left and stopped testing me." I shuddered, remembering my own days at the School.

What a dark, grim thing for a possibly four-year-old girl to say. "You have to pick a day too," I told her gently.

"What did you say my cage's tag said?" she asked. I looked back over to the first page. "Subject AKW-3," I answered.

"I pick three then," she said. Ivy Avenue, whose birthday is on January 3rd. _Not bad,_ I thought. I looked at her again. She was still wearing her hospital gown. I looked through my bags, and took out the four shirts I had packed. "Pick one," I tell her.

She immediately picked a striped black and gray shirt with long sleeves. I pawed through my backpack and found some old black tights. What are those doing there? I don't wear tights, I thought. I handed Ivy both.

She rushed into the bathroom and came back out wearing what looked like a striped dress over black leggings. Close enough. Maybe she could wear some of Angel's old clothes when we went back home.

But were we going to bring her home? And, more importantly, did she want to come with live with us?


	4. Chapter 4

_What do four-year-olds like to do? _I tried to think back to when Angel was little. Ivy was going to get bored of fluttering around in the fancy hotel suite at some point. She was really getting better at flying. She could even stay up in the air for a while. Gazzy and Angel were teaching her how to do simple tricks, how to move around while in mid air. As soon as I had officially introduced her to the flock as _Ivy_, they had accepted her in.

I had to say, she was adorable. And I was so, so proud of the flock. I had thought they would be jealous. I wasn't sure how Angel would to react to having another little girl, other than her.

_I still am your little girl, right?_ Angel barged into my thoughts. _Of course_, I thought back. I looked over the room, where Angel was doing flying somersaults. On the exterior, she was smiling and carefree, but I could see she had her innocent blue eyes trained on me. No matter what, she was still my baby.

Angel smiled a little and nodded, and I knew she had heard that. Fang was typing away at his computer, the blue glow lighting up his face. Iggy was listening to music on his iPod, dangling a leg over his bed. Nudge was reading a magazine she had taken out of her overstuffed sparkly purple backpack. What did Ivy do, by herself? I looked back at her. She was still busy "flying." Her small striped wings beat fast, trying to support her.

She'd get tired eventually. As I thought that, she fell on the ground, exhausted. She crawled over to her bed and in one last effort, fluttered up. She stayed on the bed, unmoving, her wings spread out on top of her. I opened a drawer in my night table and saw a pad of paper with the Best Western logo. On it was carefully laid a Best Western pen.

I handed Ivy both things. "Here, you can draw with these." Her face lit up and she took the paper and pen and started scribbling. I saw her sketch out a circle then add a semi-circle underneath. She drew some lines on it, and started to sketch out lines and shapes. Watching her carefully, I saw she was making a face.

She finished and gave it to me. "It's you," she said. Usually, when a four-year-old draws you, it's a smiley face on top of a triangle. Looking at it, I really recognized myself. It was so realistic. In a few imprecise lines, she had captured my face, my expression. I could tell I looked determined.

I looked back at Ivy. She was scribbling again, drawing an eye with a tear in its corner. It was breathtaking. "Where did you learn to draw?" I asked her. She looked at me then frowned. "The whitecoats. They would give me an injection then make me draw. Something about my right brain."

She rubbed her left arm. I could see there was a spot where there was a neat row of red dots. They were punctures from the needles. She started drawing again and I let her be. I was staring at the picture she drew of me. She captured everything, the strand of hair I put behind my ear sometimes, the fold of the neck of my shirt…

"What's that?" Fang asked from behind me. I jumped back almost a mile. "Ivy drew it," I said. I showed him. He looked at it silently, scanning it with his dark eyes. He looked at me and it was like we exchanged a whole conversation.

"It's pretty," he finally said. "Looks like you."

"The whitecoats taught her how to draw. They _enhanced_ her or something," I said, my voice shaking, unable to hide my anger. I looked over to her small form on the bed. She shook out her wings, drawing on her stomach, sketches spread out around her. Eyes, tears, hypodermic needles and different people I didn't know, crying and laughing, populated her pen drawings. They were so… vivid.

I turned and Fang was gone. I walked over to Ivy to get a closer look at what she was drawing. She was drawing Fang and I talking, like we had been a few seconds ago. Gazzy walked up to us.

"Whatcha doing?" he asked, his mouth full with candy that I did _not_ buy him. He looked over at the picture of Fang and I. "Whoa," he exclaimed. "Draw me!"

"Okay," Ivy smiled, and ripped out the page. She started to sketch out some basic shapes, and in a minute she had Gazzy flying through the air, his wings beating fast. They weren't really moving, but I could sense the motion, like she had taken a picture.

A crowd had started to form around Ivy. "Ooh! Draw me!" Nudge said. She smiled widely and sat on the bed, posing for the portrait and fixing her hair. Angel wanted a picture of Celeste next, and Ivy started scribbling frantically.

A few minutes later, she produced a photograph-like drawing of Nudge, smiling on the bed. She also had Angel holding Celeste. Angel took the picture hungrily and trotted off with it.

Ivy went back to drawing fractured images of lab equipment. Cages, DNA strands, computers, pills, needles, were all stacked together, evoking a nightmare. Her work was beautiful, but also terrifying.

Everyone was asleep, or so I thought. I needed to go get some air. There was a window that opened to the street in the bathroom. I could just fly around and come back. I did a quick head count. Fang, Gazzy, Nudge, Angel, Iggy… Where was Ivy? I looked to her bed, the dim light barely illuminating anything. Her bed was empty, no doubt about it.

I left the room and opened the door to the luxuriously large bathroom. The window I had planned to jump out of was wide open, and sitting under it was Ivy. Her wings were extended, and a small breeze ruffled her feathers.

I saw she was looking at something intently. A bird was perched on a building. I recognized it from the Patterson Park bird tour. It was a red-tailed hawk. It extended its wings, shaking them out. I saw why she was so taken by this bird. Its feathers were brown at the tips of the primaries, and white with fuzzy gray stripes. They were just like hers.

She shook out her wings, imitating the hawk. "I guess I'm part hawk then," she said. We watched the hawk together. It stepped out onto the edge of the building and flew away. It was probably flying to a park or bird reserve. Heck, it could have been flying to evil-scientist playground Patterson Park.

"Do you think I'll ever find my parents?" she asked. I looked at her. She was so young…how could I really answer this question? "I don't know, kiddo."

"Can… can I stay with the flock until then?" she asked timidly. I made a split-second executive decision as flock leader. "Yes," I said, and I thought I heard a sigh of relief coming from Ivy.


	5. Chapter 5

Time for the fun vacation I had promised everyone. Actually, it was the fun vacation _Fang_ had promised everyone, and he had sort of dumped it on me. What's a fun vacation without ice cream? We were outside, visiting the inner harbor. There was this store that had huge candy and crazy things like bacon-flavored gum. And an ice cream shop.

We all filed in, and Gazzy immediately ran towards gummy bears twice the size of his head. I had given them each twenty dollars from my magical bottomless credit card, and I could tell they were going to spend every last cent of it. Angel ran towards the ice cream counter and started ordering this huge, pink pile of fluffiness. Iggy was asking Nudge what everything was, and they were both at the stand where they sold candy by weight.

Fang, surprisingly, was looking around. He had found a rack of sarcastic magnets. Perfect, because that's what I really need in my life, more sarcasm coming from the flock.

Ivy had been immediately drawn to this huge rack of bacon-flavored _anything_. Who knew? I walked around a little, looking at everything. This would have been my dream had I been, say, ten years younger. I looked at huge lollipops and rice krispies that would feed us for a week, or industrial servings of Nerds. This place was, to say the least, creepy.

Half an hour later, I dragged the flock out of that nightmare place. Nudge looked like a model for candy jewelry: she had six candy necklaces strung around her neck, a ring pop on every finger, and was licking a huge rainbow swirl lollipop. Ivy was chewing bacon gum, and she probably had a bag full of other bacon products. She also had a huge ice cream cone toppling with flavors that shouldn't go together: watermelon, bacon, coconut, strawberry, chocolate, nutella, kiwi, and salty caramel. I flinched when she passed by me, sure the tower would fall over.

Angel was holding four sizeable jars filled to the brim with gummy worms, sour gummy worms, watermelon gummies, and Swedish Fish. She was chewing on a colorful rainbow mixture of a few of those flavors. Iggy came out holding different tins. They were sparkly and pink, and decorated with cupcakes. I looked over at Nudge, who had been with Iggy when he was shopping. "Inside, they're all mints," she said defensively.

I gave her a look that could kill, but she had turned away and was sucking on her candy jewelry. Gazzy had the store's famous 5-pound gummy bear, and a huge gummy worm he had around his neck like a snake. I had seen those in the store, I was pretty sure both of them cost more than twenty bucks. Fang came out last, holding one small bag of chocolate-covered coffee beans.

He had probably given his extra money to Gazzy. I was about to tell him he shouldn't let Gazzy poison himself with sugar, when he handed me a coffee bean.

"Want one?" he asked. I took it hungrily. "Oh, god, yes. I _need_ coffee." I but into the small candy, and it was overwhelmingly bitter then sweet like chocolate. Now I could proceed with the day.

"Look!" Gazzy yelled. "It's the USS Constellation!" I forced my face into an enthusiastic expression, and Fang almost smiled reassuringly. "Shi


	6. Chapter 6

As you might have guessed, visiting the Constellation wasn't enough. We had to go see the USS Torsk. A small boat I could deal with, but a tiny submarine? No way. What if we got trapped, or ran out of air, or… I stopped thinking of scary possibilities. Of course, that didn't stop Gazzy, Nudge, Angel and Iggy from wanting to go. I stood facing the long, narrow submarine. It had a shark mouth painted on it. It was painfully small, even from the outside.

The others all hopped in, showing the tickets we had bought. Ivy had stayed behind with me, her eyes wide with fear. Another claustrophobe, who happened to be a bird girl. There was no way I was getting on that tiny deathtrap. I stayed on the dock with Ivy. Fang started to get up into the ship, and he shot a glance back at me. I looked at him and he nodded. He could take care of the flock.

I stayed outside in the big, open space, breathing in fresh air. Gulls shrieked around me and a breeze blew salty air around. Boats floated calmly on the beautiful blue waters. I was completely nervous and jumpy.

Why were they taking so long? _Control your mother hen instincts, _I told myself. I looked at Ivy. She took out a small bottle from her bag, shook it and sprayed it into the air. Our immediate area instantly smelled of bacon. She put it back in the bag and started taking deep breaths. I almost gagged and stepped away, gasping for fresh salty air again.

A few minutes later, she took out her gum and started chewing. I started to get impatient. The boat was so small, ten minutes was _way too long_. "I'm going in," I told Ivy. She looked at me uncertainly. She didn't seem like she wanted to follow me. I steeled myself and walked up the ramp. I showed the guard my ticket and stepped in the small hatch.

Instantly, the musty smell of old leather and seaweed attacked my nose. I walked down the small, rickety steps. Underneath, all was dim and musty. The whole submarine was practically a hallway barely big enough for me. I walked down the aisle, trying not to think about the ceiling that was so low, or how hard it would be to get out of here if it collapsed.

I moved quickly, pushing past the occasional family of tourists. I reached the end of the hallway and there was the rest of the flock. They were listening to a tour guide drone on about the sub's history. Fang noticed me and shot me a grateful look. Everyone was ready to leave. Even Gazzy, who really wanted to see the sub, was bored of it already.

We walked up another staircase and up into the deck of the submarine. I took a breath of fresh air, and looked down. Ivy's small form was regarding us from below. "Can we go back to the hotel?" Gazzy asked in a small voice.

I was so grateful he was tired of sightseeing because I had wanted to leave since somewhere around the bacon-scented air. I smiled at him. "Sure," I said.

We walked down another ramp into the afternoon light, heading towards the hotel, our temporary home.


	7. Chapter 7

Ivy held the paper in her hands. She sounded out the letters, just like they had taught her. She saw numbers. The whitecoats had taught her numbers. She read "two-zero-three-three." She repeated the number to herself. Then, it said "Ivy Ave." What did "ave" mean? Ivy called over to Max.

"Max?" she asked. "What, sweetie?" she called back. She looked back to the paper. "What does ah-vee mean?"

Max jumped lightly off of the bed to come see her. Why didn't she just fly over? Ivy couldn't wait until she could learn to fly as well as them. She would probably never even walk again!

Max's eyes scanned she paper. "It's Ave," she said. "It means 'avenue'." Ivy Avenue. "Like my last name," Ivy remarked. Max nodded.

Good. Ivy had gotten this far. Max walked back over to her bed. She read it again. "Two-zero-three-three-ivy-avenue." She mumbled it to herself. She looked at the last part. There were a lot of letters. She tried to sound them out. "B-ah-l-t-ih-m-oh-rr-e." Did that mean it was "baltimory"? She recognized it. "Baltimore," of course, the city she was born in. Then, it said "MD." "Baltimore, Em-Dee," she said to herself.

She tried saying it as a whole. "Two-zero-three-three-ivy-ave-baltimore-em-dee." Ivy smiled. She had memorized her home.

"Can I have money?" Ivy asked suddenly. I looked at her strangely. Why exactly did she need money? "Why?" I asked.

"Um," she said. "So I can go home." My heart sank. How could I really tell her this? I pulled her up to my bed and sat her on my lap. I decided to hear her out.

"Where's home?" I asked her. "Two-zero-three-three-ivy-avenue-baltimore-em-dee," she recited proudly. She meant 2033 Ivy Ave, Baltimore, MD, her parents' old address.

"Your parents' address," I said. "Uh-huh," she nodded. I was going to have to break the hard truth to her at some point.

"Your parents don't live there anymore. They moved," I said gently. I let this sink in. Ivy put on a stubborn face.

"They'll be there," she said. "I want to go." I shook my head sadly. "I'm sorry." She jumped off of the bed but never made it to the ground. She flew over to her bed, beating her wings fast. She was getting better every day, and I could tell she made an effort to fly when she could.

If only she could accept the truth about her parents.

Ivy knew everyone was asleep. Fang had closed his laptop, Iggy had put away his iPod, Nudge hadn't made a sound for the past half hour and Max was breathing regularly.

"Two-zero-three-three-ivy-avenue-baltimore-em-dee," she whispered to herself. She walked over to Max's bed and placed the small paper on her night table. Ivy hoped she would see her again. She had been family to her, at least for two days.

Ivy walked across the big hotel room and over to the bathroom. She extended her wings and they popped out of the slits Max had made in her old striped shirt. Ivy wore it as a dress. She liked it, it reminded her of the stripes on her wings.

Ivy opened the window and crawled outside, sitting on the ledge. "Bye, Max," she whispered. She jumped out of the window and swooped away, flapping her wings powerfully.


	8. Chapter 8

Screaming and crying woke me up. Great, a beautiful new day. Nudge shook me until I finally reacted. I jumped up, ready to leave running, half-expecting an explosion. "Ivy's gone!" Nudge said, panicked.

I looked around and automatically did a quick head count. Everyone else was there. I opened the door to the bathroom and saw an open window. Oh, no. I ran back into the room. Ivy's bed was empty. She had taken her only possessions: the paper and pen. She had left her information packet from the lab.

I noticed a piece of paper on my night table. I picked it up. It was another one of her vivid pen drawings. It was Ivy on my lap, like yesterday. Instead of looking angry and stubborn like she was yesterday, we were both smiling. Underneath, in shaky handwriting, was written "IL MIS YU MAX." She could barely spell…

I gasped, one hand covering my mouth. I knew where she was going. "She went to look for her parents," I said, still dazed. How could she leave like that?

"Do you think we should let her?" Fang asked, melting out from the shadows behind me. I thought about it. Maybe she had a right to leave if she wanted. I couldn't control her. She wasn't really part of the flock.

_If I left, would you go look for me?_ Angel thought at me, interrupting my train of thought. _Haven't I again and again?_ I thought back.

Angel looked at me from across the room. She had little tears in the corners of her eyes. _I liked Ivy, _she thought. _She was like a little sister to me._

_Ivy wants to make her own choices,_ I thought back_. And I have to let her. _Angel nodded. This was really painful for me too. But she wasn't _my_ Ivy.

Ivy counted the money she had taken. She had three pieces of paper. She thought each was ten. Then, she had…thirty. She felt bad for stealing from Max, but she really had to find her parents. She knew, no matter what Max thought, they were still there. They would love her and buy her ice cream.

Then maybe the flock could come live with her. Ivy would become a world-famous artist, then a president. And she would have fifty dogs! Ivy smiled at the thought.

She went up to an information booth. She was at Penn Station Marc, a weird place where she could go take a _bus _to her house. The whitecoats had taught her about buses, but she had never taken a real one.

She leaned up to the tall window. She was itching to take out her wings and fly around, but she knew she couldn't do that there. The lady smiled at her. "I want to go to two-zero-three-three-ivy-avenue-baltimore-em-dee," Ivy piped up, proud she remembered the address.

The woman looked surprised. "Well, miss…"

"Avenue," Ivy supplied. "Miss Avenue, if you want to go to Ivy Avenue, then you should take route 2."

"How much?" Ivy asked. The woman looked at a paper. "Three dollars." Ivy handed her a bill and the lady gave her a strange coin, along with more money. The lady must have noticed Ivy's confusion, because she added: "The coin is a token. You put it in the machine when you get into the train, underground. Then, you get off at the stop that's called 'Ivy Avenue.'" Ivy smiled at the lady and walked on.

A little further to go, and she would be at her parents' house. She couldn't wait to meet them—and show them her wings.


	9. Chapter 9

Pretty much, we spent the day moping. I lied down on my bed, staring at the pictures Ivy left. Fang spent his day on his laptop, of course, but sneaking worried glances at me once in a while. Nudge alternated between eating candy and reading magazines. Iggy listened to music sullenly, his eyes unnecessarily closed. Angel and Gazzy played catch in the air, throwing someone's socks at each other.

I was about to suggest we take a walk outside when a small object, the size of a ball, flew in a half-open window. It grew spidery legs and started moving across the floor. It had a blinking red light and a lens on it. It moved its little camera snout to face me. It was some kind of recording device. "Kill it!" I shrieked, and dove for it.

I just missed and it skidded across the room. Everyone got up and tried to get it. It ran over to Iggy's bed, and he swatted at it, only to have it run over to my bed. Gazzy landed and tried to crush it with his feet, but he barely missed. Angel ran after it and cupped it in her hands. Everyone was up, breathing hard.

I took the spider bot, its legs still squirming, and looked at it. It was probably recording us. But why? I handed it to Fang. He looked at it then placed it carefully on the ground, holding it down. He stomped on it once, hard. The robot was only smashed pieces. He scooped them up and gave them to Iggy. "You can make a bomb out of it," he said.

The big question here was: why were we being filmed? Everyone was getting ready to go back to passive boredom, but Iggy was frozen listening. He pointed at the door. I turned around, and saw the doorknob slowly turning. How was that possible? You needed the key card for that!

"Guys," I whispered urgently, motioning towards the door. They had caught it too, and turned to face whatever was coming. The door burst open to reveal five howling Erasers.

"Where is Subject AKW-3?" One growled. I recognized Ivy's lab name. The Eraser in the front started to walk towards us, very slowly. The effect was largely ruined when he spontaneously combusted. I turned back to see Iggy and Gazzy, who had produced small explosives. "Go!" I yelled.

I kicked an Eraser in the head and he fell to the ground. Another one slashed at me with huge claws and missed. I punched him, hard, and he fell on top of his friend. We were breaking through. "Let's get out of here!" Fang started giving out our packs he had taken from the room.

I jumped over the Erasers that had fallen, and another one came out and punched me in the ribs. I heard a discouraging crack but Fang punched him and he fell over. I stepped on him mercilessly. We ran down the stairs, still hearing angry howling. We burst into the chandeliered lobby and ran outside. There, I snapped my wings open and took to the sky.

"Report!" I shouted over the wind. "I'm okay," Nudge said. "Fine," Iggy said. Fang was next to me and Angel and Gazzy said something I didn't catch. For a moment, I panicked, thinking there was someone missing, then I remembered Ivy was gone.

I surveyed the area. We were flying over a highway, but I could see a big park with a lake up ahead north. We could spend the night there. "Guess staying in a hotel was too good to be true," Nudge sighed. I had to agree. We really never got any rest.


	10. Chapter 10

I leaned back further into the hard tree. I had just gotten too used to sleeping in a bed. I missed home in Colorado. I just wanted to leave this annoying harbor city and go home. But if I did, then I could be sure I was abandoning Ivy. If she wanted to look for us, then she would probably go back to the hotel. The hotel room would be empty, and maybe the area would still be crawling with Erasers.

And there was nothing I could do about that. Ivy had no phone, no nothing. I folded my wings in tighter to see if they could pillow my back. I let out a final sigh. "What's wrong?" Fang asked me.

"Nothing," I grumbled. He looked at me, popping out of the shadows, and I knew he wasn't going to accept a lie for an answer. "You've been squirming around for half an hour, and sighing," he pointed out.

"Well, what if Ivy comes looking for us?" I snapped. "She'll find an empty hotel, possibly full of Erasers." I surveyed the area automatically, as if saying their name would make them appear. That hadn't been too far from reality in the past.

"We can look for her," Fang suggested, saying out loud what I didn't dare think. "Do you really think it's the right thing to do?" I asked.

Fang paused, thinking. "It all really depends on whether you _want_ to find her." I started to open my mouth to say indignantly, Of course I want to find her, but then I shut it again. Why hadn't I come after her immediately then?

_Do I really want to find Ivy?_ I asked myself. My brain felt slow, and I realized I was falling asleep.

"'Kay troops, rise and shine!" I shouted at the sleeping flock. A tired grumble answered me. "Come on, we have a rescue mission!" I started handing cupcakes to everyone. It was the cheapest thing at the closest store, all right?

They were rainbow with white icing and multicolored sprinkles. I bit into one. The sugar rush would help everyone wake up. Nudge opened her eyes, and when she saw the cupcake, shrieked and dropped it. From below, I swooped up and caught it. "What?" I asked her.

She was staring at it with wide eyes, freaking out. "Rainbow…cupcakes?" she asked, stammering. I gave it back to her and she left it on the branch, as far away from her body as possible.

"Do you know My Little Pony?" she asked. I frowned. "No, isn't that for little kids?" Nudge sighed. "Never mind."

I started throwing bananas and oranges at them. Everyone started eating and stretching. Fang regarded the banana in his hand. He looked up at me, amused. His expression clearly said, Oh, so you're saving her now. I nodded proudly like, Duh, and started gently shaking Angel awake.

Ten dollars later, we had a map and coffee for Iggy, Fang, Nudge and I. Have you ever tried flying without spilling a hot drink on your family's heads? No, I bet you haven't. I was trying to gulp down hot coffee, while reading a map, and also flying, and how about adding keeping the sleepy younger kids on track.

As Nudge's smile widened, I knew I was going to regret getting her coffee. I looked down. The fat yellow line on the map was actually a highway. I looked above my steaming cup of coffee to the now soggy paper map. "We have to head southwest!" I shouted for anyone's benefit.

Nudge nodded, coffee practically coming out of her ears. I swerved away before she could start talking. I surveyed the ground, watching streets and avenues go by. Finally, we reached what the map had labeled "Ivy Avenue." I was small and curved, with a row of spaced-out houses. The sun was shining on the quiet street, and a few cars sit neatly in driveways.

Birds chirped and the prim brick houses just sat there, still in silence. This would be a nice place to live. If you were a regular person, that is. This candy-land avenue was making me want to barf.

I scanned the houses, looking for 2033. Finally, I found it. An imposing, white-walled house with gold letters announcing it was house 2033. What did I do next? I walked up to it and rang the doorbell.

Okay, it wasn't the stealthiest thing to do, but I had no choice. There was no answer. I tried knocking on the door, and it just swung open. It wasn't locked? The inside was dark, like it was empty. Steeling myself, and motioning over to the flock, I went into the house.


	11. Chapter 11

The door creaked behind me as I entered. The air was musty and stale, like no one had been there in years. What had happened to this place? Through the darkness, I saw a staircase. "Hold the door open," I told Nudge.

It would be the only light I could get. I went upstairs, and pictures lined the wall. They showed a man, a woman, and a baby. The baby looked something like Ivy, I guess. They shared the same wide gray eyes.

I reached the top of the creaking steps. The dim hallway led to two rooms. Both doors were closed. I went into the one on my left slowly. I opened the door and saw a bed, coated with heavy dust. A stack of papers sat on it. Forms for the Institute for Higher Aeronautics, and consent forms for recombinant DNA tests. Riffling through, I saw the last page dealed with payment methods. Ivy had been sold to the lab. How would this fit with her dream of having a family?

There was one door left. I left this room quietly, and slowly opened the door. It was a small child's room, painted pink. On the wall, there was written in babyish block letters, "Adelyn." Ivy's real name was Adelyn? It was a pretty name. Would she want to go by that now?

In the far corner, in a musty dark corner, was a small bed. It was a big crib at most. Curled up in it was a small figure. Could it be? Holding my breath, I walked over. I could hear regular breathing coming from the corner.

I bent over the bed and saw a tangle of light brown hair. "Ivy?" I breathed. She turned over and smiled dreamily. "Hi, Max," she mumbled. She moved one arm up to greet me, and I saw an IV connected to it.

My eyes widened in horror. "What's…what's that on your arm?" I stammered. She looked at it, and I saw a flash of insanity light up her eyes. She took out her other arm, revealing a row of suction cups and wires attached to it, probably measuring different things. I could barely breathe.

"Max?" someone breathed from behind me. I whirled around to find Fang. He had just seen Ivy and the things connected to her arms. As she fidgeted more, I saw some machines were plugged to the wall.

I turned back to Fang. "Disconnect her and go. I'll get the flock out," I whispered urgently. As Fang nodded, Ivy pressed a button on her arm. An alarm started to shriek. It had all been a trap.

I raced downstairs and gathered everyone. I saw Nudge, Iggy, and Gazzy waiting around anxiously, alerted by the noise. "Where's Angel?" I shrieked. Everyone looked around, not seeing her. "Um," Iggy stammered.

Where could she be? I decided to give away where we were, just to get my baby back. "Angel!" I screamed. She ran out of the kitchen, panicked. "We're leaving," I told her.

She looked around. "What about Fang?" My throat tightened and I didn't answer. I grabbed her arm and tried to wrench the door open. "Open, damn it!" I screamed, on the edge of a panic attack. I hated everything about this place, and about leaving Fang upstairs with zombie-Ivy. I started kicking at the door, but it wouldn't budge.

Fang ran downstairs carrying Ivy, who was still trailing wires. She was squirming around, trying to break free. I didn't know who had hurt her, but they were going to pay.

"MOVE!" Gazzy yelled. I moved back without question. He pulled something out of an inner pocket in his coat. It was metallic, and he twisted it and threw it at the door. An explosion shook the floor of the rotting house. He had blasted both doors clean off. I barreled through, followed by the others.

We ran out then saw that Erasers surrounded the house. Who knew? My day really _could_ get worse. They licked their wolf lips, and I saw behind them a pair of whitecoats. It was a man and a woman, their eyes furious. I knew them…

They were the ones from the pictures in the stairs! The whitecoats were Ivy's _parents. _"Release Subject AKW-3," the man commanded. Fang didn't move.

"That's your daughter!" I screamed. "Not a _subject_." The woman laughed mercilessly.

"Our daughter? We gave Adelyn to science," she said. How could she not feel anything? I looked around. We could break through the Erasers.

Disgusted, I shouted to the flock, "Go!" Then, all hell broke loose. I ran forward, aiming at the whitecoats. An Eraser kicked me in the same spot in the ribs as in the hotel. I doubled over, and Fang knocked him out. Rage fueling me, I punched one in the face twice, hard. He fell over. An explosion shook the ground, taking out about a dozen Erasers.

"U and A!" I yelled. I started to fly up, kicking at the Erasers below. Nudge whizzed past me. Gazzy dropped another bomb from above, exploding more Erasers. Angel flitted past me. I started to rise up, and saw Iggy detaching himself from the fight below. _Where was Fang?_

Slowly, he flew up, still pulling Ivy, who refused to fly. I got closer to her and ripped out the wires on her arms. Ivy went out cold. "I'll take her," I offered.

Fang gently passed her over to me. I flapped twice as hard, for both of us. Everyone looked _really_ tired. Maybe there was some _other_ hotel we hadn't seen?

The cheap room satisfied everyone. A room is still better than, say, a tree or a cave. I spread out on my bed, wincing. I was pretty sure I'd broken a rib. Ivy was still out cold.

"Are you okay?" Fang asked. "Does it hurt?" I rolled my eyes at him.

"Only when I laugh," I answered. I tried turning over into a more comfortable position. Note to self: when you break ribs, there is no comfortable position.

Well, let's review. I had: gotten hurt, gotten the flock hurt, broken Ivy's dreams, and still not found a cure for her. That's what I call a failure.

_Don't be so hard on yourself,_ I heard in my head. I looked around then recognized Angel's voice. _She was brainwashed. She's dreaming of you right now. _ I stopped for a moment, weighing this down. _Do you always listen in on our dreams?_ I thought.

Angel paused in her thoughts. _Sometimes_, she thought at me. _Fang and Iggy… you don't want to know. _I let the possibilities run through my head for a second, and then stopped. She was right, I _didn't _want to know. I looked over at Angel, hoping she hadn't caught all those thoughts. She was making a weird face. _Crap._


	12. Chapter 12

I woke up to Ivy mumbling in her sleep. Usually, that wouldn't even faze me. But, considering she had been brainwashed and tried to give us in to the whitecoats, I was just a little suspicious of her. I felt terrible, treating her like the enemy, when I had cared for her like she was my own daughter for a few days.

_Don't think that,_ I told myself. _That's what you used to say for Angel._ I still loved Angel, and probably more than Ivy, I thought, half to reassure myself. I stepped over to Ivy's bed. She was muttering to herself: _2033 Ivy Avenue, Baltimore, MD._ She said her parents' address again and again.

Her lashes fluttered but she kept sleeping. It seemed as if nothing would wake her.

Ivy dreamed, slowly remembering her journey. She felt heavy and tired and never wanted to wake up. Ivy saw, in her mind, her house. It was just where the man on the street had told her after she got off the subway. It was beautiful, with sturdy white walls. Ivy remembered knocking on the door.

_ A woman opened the door—her mother! She had sparkling eyes and a warm voice. She let Ivy in to the house and introduced her to her father. He was kind and smiled a lot. They were both dressed in white, like at the lab. Wasn't that the way _all_ adults dressed?_

_ They explained why they needed to test on Ivy. They needed to save the world. And studying Ivy would help them do that. They said that after, they would keep her. They would give her anything she wanted. Ivy agreed, and they connected machines to her arms. They told them that if the flock would come to take her away, she should press a special button._

_ Ivy was sad when she heard that, she told them the flock was nice to her. They told her they were just keeping her away from her own parents because they didn't have any and were _jealous.

_ They gave her a small IV, and fell Ivy fell asleep happily. They kept calling her Adelyn. Ivy didn't tell them she had picked her own name._

"Ivy?" I shook her gently. She was frowning in her sleep and shaking her head. It was like she wanted to wake up but couldn't. She started to shake under me. What was wrong with her? "Ivy?" I asked a bit louder, panic creeping into my voice.

Her eyes were open a slit, and she was still shaking head to toe. I didn't know what to do; I just held her small body. Wasn't this what happened when people were poisoned on TV?

"It's probably a side effect from the drugs they gave her," Fang said. I didn't know he was awake. "I'll go get some water," he said and got up. I held Ivy's cold hand and kneeled by her bed. The shaking had stopped, but I was really scared.

Fang handed me a Styrofoam cup filled with lukewarm water. I brought it up to Ivy's lips and, spilling some, had her drink at least half of it. She slowly stopped shaking, and now was just shivering slightly. I ripped my covers off of my bed and placed them over her.

Bringing my pillow over, I stayed next to her bed, deciding to keep watch in case she started shaking again.

"Ow!" I screamed, muffled by the pillow. "Morning," Iggy said casually. I looked up at him through tendrils in messy hair in my face.

"You just stepped on me," I said, indignant. He just shrugged. "It's your own fault. You should tell people before you decide to sleep on the floor."

I threw my pillow at him and missed. "Come on," Iggy called. "Even I can throw better than that." I growled like a wild animal and picked myself up off the floor. I had fallen asleep on the floor next to Ivy's bed. I stretched and heard every bone I had crack.

I looked down at Ivy. Was she still sleeping? I slowly moved her hair out from in front of her face. Yes, she was. Slowly, I stepped back away from her. Iggy was cooking breakfast in the small microwave that had been provided.

"May I ask where you got the money to buy that?" I asked the flock in general. "Well, you were asleep," Gazzy shrugged, as if that justified everything. I sighed. They were really a lost cause.

"Try not to go through my stuff," I said half-heartedly, not sure why I was wasting my breath on people who wouldn't listen. Iggy took out steaming waffles, bacon, and sausages from the microwave. I might have been bad at cooking, but _anyone_ can press buttons on microwaves.

"If you cooked, even with the microwave, you would probably burn it," Angel said thoughtfully. "Remember that time, you tried to make cookies? But you put them in the microwave, and added too much yeast, and forgot a spoon in there…" Angel trailed off.

Everyone chuckled, remembering. I _did _remember that. I was forced to go buy a new microwave after that. "But it was your fault," Angel said. She was really overdoing it there. _Stop eavesdropping on my thoughts,_ I thought hard, hoping Angel would hear.

She just turned her innocent blue eyes to her waffle. She was piling sugar onto it. It formed a small white mountain. I guess when you have no maple syrup sugar is fine…

Nudge was poking at a piece of bacon with tired eyes. She had been the last to go to bed last night. Coffee did not go down well with her. Note: coffee+Nudge= disaster.

Iggy took out the last batch of breakfast from the microwave and sat down to the small table that had been provided. Gazzy munched on a sausage thoughtfully. We were all here, except Ivy.

Just as I was thinking that, a shout echoed across the room. "Mommy! Daddy!"


	13. Chapter 13

I rushed over to Ivy's bed. She had woken up suddenly and was panicking. "Where are my parents?" she asked, out of breath.

"Not here," I said, gulping. I decided to just let it all out. "They were whitecoats. They wanted to experiment on you. They didn't love you," the words came out rushed.

Ivy's eyes widened and she looked at me suspiciously. "They said they would keep me. We were going to be a family and buy ice cream and paint the walls rainbow stripes…" she trailed off. They had probably agreed to anything she said, but they were lying.

_I love Ivy more than those whitecoats! _I thought angrily as I stroked her tangled hair. She started crying and I pulled her up into a hug. It had been the first time I'd seen her cry; after all she'd been through.

She was only four after all, or so I thought. She let go and gradually stopped hiccupping. She wiped at her eyes and I asked her if she wanted breakfast. She nodded tearfully.

I picked her up and brought her over to the table. I let her sit at my spot, at the head of the table. Everyone was silent. Even Nudge wasn't talking. Fang was poking moodily at his waffle, once in a while glancing at me, then at Ivy.

_They're scared of her_, Angel sent me her thought. _All of them except Fang. He's worried about you, thinks you're tired and over-attached to her._ I glared at Fang. He was still poking at his food as if nothing had happened.

_I know you're mad at him,_ Angel thought. _And I'll stop talking to you telepathically 'cause I can tell you're annoyed at me too._ I looked over at Angel. She was chewing on another one of her sugar waffles. She looked really happy.

If I kept being this bad of a mom, I would end up with the whole flock on a sugar rush or in shock from the caffeine overdose. _Just one last one,_ Angel thought at me, and attacked another sugar waffle.

Ivy was taking another sizeable portion of bacon and shoveling it in happily. "This is really good, Iggy," she said somewhat shyly. His mouth quirked a little, something of a modest smile. Almost.

_Iggy thinks Ivy is cute but sort of a burden. He's also worried that my feelings will be hurt. Why does everyone think that_? Angel thought at me.

"Stop thinking!" I yelled. I realized I had just said that out loud. Everyone was staring at me, meanwhile, Angel downed another sugar waffle. I tried to change the subject.

"So Ivy, how are you feeling?" I asked her. Her pupils widened and contracted. "Adelyn."


	14. Chapter 14

My throat was suddenly dry. "What?" I croaked. Ivy turned to face me, her eyes dead serious. "That's my real name," she explained.

Everyone at the table was recovering from the shock. Fang was choking a little on his waffle. I looked straight into Angel's eyes. They were blue and impassive.

"Um, Adelyn," I cleared my throat. "How are you?" Everyone looked at her, expecting an answer.

"I'm tired, and dizzy," she said, inhaling some sausages. She certainly _looked _fine. "And I ripped the shirt you gave me," she said apologetically. I saw a big gash in the back and the frayed edges.

She really needed something to wear that was her size. I looked over at everyone's dirty, ripped clothes. "We need to get new clothes. All of us," I said, not believing what I was saying.

Nudge's eyes widened to the size of dinner plates. "Shopping?" she squealed.

Okay, this place was really making me jumpy. I looked over at a security guard. With his dark glasses and combed-back hair, he really looked like an unmorphed Eraser. Except he didn't have the wolfish look, and was a bit old. He'd have expired by now.

I had chosen three shirts, all of them basic with plain colors. I also took a blue fleece hoodie that said "Baltimore." I picked up a new pair of jeans along the way. I looked over to the others' purchases, standing in line.

Fang had, surprise, bought a black shirt and jacket. At least they were newer and cleaner than the ones he was wearing.

Nudge had bought five fashionable skirts, "cute" tops, and t-shirts, tank tops, and long-sleeved shirts for something she called "layering." I had vaguely understood it meant putting on a long-sleeved shirt under t-shirt.

She also had other unidentifiable lumps of clothing I took to be pants and scarves. I really couldn't see the difference.

Gazzy had just bought a clean shirt with Mario on it, some new pants, and sporty sneakers. _That's my Gazzy,_ I thought, _Not going overboard with this._ I looked at Nudge worriedly.

Angel had bought purple and blue leggings. She had also gotten a shirt, a jean jacket, and a tutu. The tutu was pink and big and I was forced to watch her buy it. The shirt had too many hearts on it and a puppy with scarily wide eyes.

Iggy had picked shirts totally at random, looking for the fabric with the softest feel. He refused any help since the cupcake mint tin incident. I didn't have the heart to tell him one of his shirts said "Daddy's little girl." I just discreetly took it out of his hands when he wasn't paying attention.

Ivy—no, Adelyn, had picked three simple striped shirts, one black and white, the other gray and white, the third red and white. She also picked small sweatpants. Who knew they had such tiny clothes for four-year-olds. I also bought her shoes, she picked a pair of navy blue imitation Converses. She had also quietly added a small headband and hair clip to her pile.

I paid for all the clothes, and the woman at the cash register looked surprised. I was only too used to the stares and strange looks. Good thing I hadn't taken my wings out, she really would have freaked.

I left the place in a hurry. We all took turns hiding in a small cluster of trees to change. Nudge came out looking like a model, Angel looking like an adorable clown, and Fang was pretty much the same.

Angel looked offended, and I realized she had picked up on my calling her a clown. _Sorry,_ I thought. _Love you_.

Iggy walked out, last of us, and turned on himself, confused. I touched his arm and he spun around to face me. "Lost track for a second," he said quietly.

"So," Fang challenged. "What's the plan?" I thought for a second. _We need a plan. Quick! Pick anything!_

"Um," I stalled, looking at Fang's dark eyes. He smirked at me. I almost got lost for a second then tore my gaze away. "Our vacation is over," I announced. "Now, we go home."

"I can't go," Ivy-Adelyn said quietly. We all spun around to face her.


	15. Chapter 15

**A/N: Last chapter. Warning: somewhat sad. Thank you for reviewing: Nudge's Twin**

"Why not?" I asked, and it was almost a whine. Why was Ivy—Adelyn acting so weirdly?

"I don't want to live in Colorado. I want to live in Baltimore." She explained slowly. I tried to clear away the tears forming in my eyes. The flock was right—I was overattached.

"You can't go back to your parents," I said quietly. She nodded. "I met people from my lab on the way there. They had wings. They were making their own flock. They said I could stay."

She was picking another flock instead of us? Maybe she just liked Baltimore. I nodded and hugged her. "If you ever need anything, call, okay?"

I searched through my backpack, pulled out two hundred bucks, and wrote my phone number on a paper. I handed her both things. "Will you be okay?" I asked her.

She nodded reassuringly. "This is my city," she said, and I almost understood. She needed the spray of salty air, the docks, the water. I let her go and she flapped her wings. We had taught her to fly. I watched her get smaller in the horizon as Fang squeezed my hand reassuringly. She became a speck in the sky and my eyes blurred with tears.

I blinked them away, swallowing my grief. "Let's go home," I said quietly. We rose silently, Fang still holding on to my hand. I don't know how long we would be able to fly that way, but I really needed the comfort of someone being there for me.

I looked at Nudge carefully. The shirt she had picked had black and gray stripes. She smiled at me sadly and I let the first tear fall. I felt the wind drying it, and the salty air was saying goodbye, from Baltimore, and from Ivy.

**I really needed to end this story. No more plot. I have others going on too, if you care to check them out!**


	16. Chapter 16

**A/N: Sorry everyone, this isn't a new chapter. As I said, the story is done. But I do have some good news! I'm making a sequel, Stripes and Feathers. I'll be posting the first chapter soon (today or tomorrow hopefully). This is just for everyone who follows the story, so you can know about the sequel. Thank you for all of the reviews, and it's because of all that awesome feedback that I'm making another one. Bye!**

**~greysky3**


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